On the distant world of Genoad however, an entirely different battle was being fought.

Lord Admiral Asharen was infused with anger, a deep seated rage that was now seeping through his demeanor and what felt like into his very soul.

Weeks after the devastation of the duchy-slaughter a dozen or so lesser families had stood forth from Juggerns influence, as predicted his efforts to garner power and habits of having fingers in every possible pie imaginable lead to an absolute dissolution of power as dozens of squabbling patriarchs stood forward with their sons and daughters so many times removed from the former ruling bloodlines - each with their heads filled with power plays, ideals of their sponsors and lineage and own dillusions of power. Each clogging what should have been an attempt to transition from disaster to greatness into the muddied waters of political backstabbing, bureaucracy and endless reciting of family lines and links that wasted time and served nothing other than to give Juggern his perverse fantasies of self-importance.

Meanwhile Lady Dirias had gone foward to the Scythian Empire - only to find out that their own Empire had been targetted by the same Immortal ploy, their Emperor now dead after years of illness, he slipped into a coma and passed away. The power gap of an heirless line of leaders was filled with an Immortal attack on their civilian populace and then a direct assault on the military leadership - her face was one of abstract horror as she watched their land-train network bombed to pieces, one of the Scythians mighty tower-cities (one that they described with the curious term "Arcology") blasted on multiple levels and then black-clad assassins teleporting out of nothingness inside the Scythians very senate building and gunning down every single Admiral and General they could assemble at the meeting that was supposed to decide how they would end the devastation of the "Immortal" war.

Lady Dirias was approached herself by an emissary of the Scythian Empires Office of Naval Intelligence, a Lieutenant to their leader-in-interim "Lord Hearcer" - a young man with sharp, piercing eyes hiding an even sharper intelligence, cropped black hair and cutting features - he introduced himself as Karsus and proposed a plan to move both empires into a greater future.

One that Juggern rebuked instantly - but the Scythians would not be held back - Genoan Grav-drives where exchanged for Scythian FTL drives and schematics to produce a number of provisional Genoan spacecraft - along with S.O.N.I military "advisers" to ease the transition into moving to full-blown space travel from what was a race that not to long ago only developed conventional electricity.

The problem was that these "advisers" now seemed to be everywhere - and Dirias has become what was damned-near a ghost - rarely seen and little heard. Whenever she did grace the world with a public appearance she was seen with at least Karsus attached to her side and the look of someone who had seen past death itself. While the Genoan people where getting results - Scythian Anti-matter generators giving regular, reliable power - Scythian medicines where making disease and illness a thing of the past - new building materials where revolutionizing the entire face of Genoad and the free flow of military technologies where turning the whole idea of armed combat on its head Asharen could not help but feel fundamentally unsettled by these events - and whats more, the youngest of the group - the Admiral Yassan had been unseen ever since the last meeting - vanished clean off of the surface of Genoad it was said.

All of this however was before the Scythians started to land en-masse, setting up small outposts on the edge of every city and military base under the guise of "Immunization centers" manned by S.O.N.I personnel, set up wit the purpose of preparing more Genoan forces against the ravages of the greater universe Karsus and Dirias repeated time and time again, but that did not change the fact that more and more Genoan troops where being whisked away into "Special field units" by Dirias shortly after being pulled through this scheme, never to be seen or heard from again.

He had to do something to save his people and find out what on Genoad was going on - so he had assembled the most loyal of his commanders to pull his men away - paperwork filed weeks in advance as a field exercise, the truth was - he was going to steal nearly a tenth of the Genoan armed forces and flee the territory ruled by the now deceased duchies and outwards into the coastal towns and villages and then beyond into the provincial seas - establish a new base of power and counter-spy on the Scythians own extent of power over his people.

He would be marked a traitor, a rebel - Dirias and Juggern would probably but the mark of death upon his head, Dirias from her masters leash, and Juggern out of good old traditional Genoan fear, but he had no choice left.

Here, in the last few minutes he would spend in his lavish military accomodation, he straightened out the imaginary creases in his deep blue admiralty uniform, carefully applied each of his medals to his chest, packed his shaving kit and then trimmed the outer most edges of his now gray mustache with his field scissors before packing those along with the rest of his items and donning his admiralty cap, he looked into the mirror into his own reflection - a look of steeled resolve as he then donned his ceremonial sabre and his combat pistol and left for the "operation" operation prepared below.

Outside it was raining, a state of permanent affairs on Genoad - rain was a thing that the small watery world had in abundance due to its nigh-tropical nature as the troops, tanks and hover skiffs assembled looked like something out of some form of alternate industrial world - whiffs of steam and electricity ebbed from vehicles as they where loaded onto the five massive Genoan hover-ships, vast Trident shaped vessels that floated by means of mono-pole magnets over the surface of large bodies of water, their hulls a pattern of gray and blue camouflage, brazen railings and gunmetal grays of cannons. The last paperwork was issued, orders made - and the five ships and the thousands of troops aboard took to the seas, abandoning the oldest and greatest city of Genoad to meet with the greater fleet over the horizon, too follow the path of their "Naval exercises" and then disappear into the great blue beyond.

Asharen would save his people, if it was the last thing he did with his life - he was Genoan, and it was his duty to serve.

A Cavorite beam pierced through space as the cloud of bullet fast red specks split at distances measuring in thousands of kilometers, each one pulling a high-gee Vanoeuvre to escape the Britannian fire that was crossing the short distance between the Scythian assault group and the Tiara station.

"Samurai flight, have located point of access - all units converge on designated position" A single Immortal pilot relayed, cold and detached over the squads intercomm system as Lord Shadowscythe watched as a small locator signal appeared on the holographic screen before him, hovering over the outermost arm of the centre Orbital elevator.

"Then remove it" A Scythian pilot interjected as the group rushed forwards, blisteringly fast red dots on a vista of black space and white stars, each fighter leaving its own distinctive blue vector trail behind it.

Across the group well over half of the fighters selected their targets and loosed a single 'fire and forget' Anti-matter missile each, the long slender missiles dragged behind the craft that launched them for just a moment before the missiles internal rockets kicked in and propelled the missiles far ahead of Samurai flight - each guided by onboard limited-AI systems to track their paths through Britannian AA fire and Cavorite beams. A lone missile or two detonated prematurely as they had been hit by enemy fire.

The rest however hit their mark - and the lone Britannian cruiser in mid-construction detonated into a blinding blue-white sphere of pure annihalation. Seconds later the sphere faded away into nothingness and the entire arm had been sheared away and the ship was nowhere to be seen - and Samruai flights point of entry had been made.

In actions that measured less than a minute Samurai flight had aligned their flightpaths to converge on the wrecked arm, splayed Britannian point defenses with focused laser fire and then shot through the wreckage of the arm and then inside the arm itself, the flight of 40 strong blocky red fighter craft now inside the superstructure of what used to be a cargo train system running down the construction arm, vaulting at high speed towards the end of the tunnel and towards the elevator structure at the stations center.

"Smash and grab in progress, expect limited resistance - you have your targets. Burn it all" The first Immortal pilot relayed as Lord Shadowscythe steeled himself for the grim brutality he was about to enact.

Lord Shadowscythe watched as the patterns of life aboard the Britannian station past his vision faster than his eyes could track, cargo trains and trucks loaded with construction materials, the beams and cross beams of ship super-structures of various Britannian capitol ships. Loading booms filled to the brim with armor plating and modular life support systems and power plants, weapon emplacements in various levels of construction of loading.

All these details shot past at blistering speeds, the air from the stations gaping wound pulling construction personnel off their feet and outwards into the void, Lord Shadowscythe himself yanking the control stick hard to avoid a flying body - a lone deck worker yanked from his feet, screaming all the way as Lord Shadowscythe narrowly avoided the lost soul for him to then impact on the shark grin of the Samurai fighter behind him - smothering its menacing visage in a crude splattering of blood and viscera.

He cringed for a moment and then re-focused on his goal, a kilometer of station passed in moments as the fourty strong flight of fighters shot through the tunnels like a bullet in the barrel of a gun into a vast open space that opened up into the central orbital elevator structure - a five hundred meter dome of control systems and storage bays that overlooked seven hexagonal elevators in an array that lead directly down to the planets surface and the underground forges beneath.

"Clear the elevators and hack the array - that's our ticket down to the surface" Lord Warhead ordered as the blocky fighter craft switched into their bipedal modes and settled onto the platforms - small antennea arrays where extended from a rough few as data packets, virus assault worms and chaff data spammed the Britannian networks from the inside out - jamming external doors wide open by exactly one inch and then turning off life support or force fields stopping explosive decompression, others slammed doors shut and then flooded entire corridors with fire suppression chemicals, choking those inside to death in less than a minute - in other cases defense systems meant to repel boarders with oppressive small arms fire turned on their masters as huge portions of the Tiara burst into firefights - shattering unprotected bodies and smearing their remains across the stations bulkhead walls.

Then, as chaos unfolded through the Tiara - the elevator crunched into life as the clutch released and the Orbital elevator began its descent towards the planets surface gaining gradual speed as the station above dissipated into the world above.

"At this point our intel drops short - all units fan out, hit as many subterranean power generators as you can to disable the defense network and keep your eyes open for Cavorite deposits - if you can, mark locations with refined materials for collection and destroy any raw deposits and manufacturing centers" The Immortal pilot from before spoke with a clear and empty tone as Lord Shadowscythe watched the moons surface growing ever closer through the poly-glass panels of the Orbitals windows.

Lord Shadowscythe took a moment or two to admire the view - the Orbital elevator still descending towards its target destination.

In the middle of a combat operation he was at least glad that Lord Warhead had kept himself quiet - but he was unsure of the real reasons why. Was it a simple urge for destruction forfilled or was it some form of bastardized professionalism in the field, or was it the fact that he had simply ran out of ego.

Whatever the real reason Lord Shadowscythe was glad for his silence as the Tiara above them exploded across the various subsections across its surface but held its integrity thanks to the other stations along the line of elevators - he watched a cloud of debris and frozen air molecules dance across the horizon of the moon in a handful of directions before the magnification lens in the HUD system kicked in and detracted the beauty of the moment with the horrible truth, marking the corpses of the dead as they drifted down, picking up speed to terminal velocity and their eventual collision with the moons surface.

He glanced away for a moment and the HUD removed the targeting reticules - the Britannian empire where enemies of the Scythian people but everything about this felt wrong, working with the Immortals - one of their plots - worsening the war in the aims of somehow saving lives.

In the pit of his soul he wondered to himself if any of these events would ever be worth the outcome, or like the once infallable Scythian Emperor he had sold his soul to darkness so others could brave a few more seconds of the light.

"ALL UNITS BREAK!" A Scythian voice yelled panicked over the TEAMCOMM system, catching Lord Shadowscythe and the other pilots by surprise as an orange lance of light shot from the planets surface and collided with the elevator.

Atomic bonds melted within a nanosecond, passing through a third of the structure and all of the Samurai fighters in the path of destruction and then onwards through the otherside and beyond the moons orbit - the pilots caught within didn't even have time to scream as their bodies turned into gelatin and exploded into pools of liquid and the blocky fighters exploded into clouds of metals, plastics and antimatter before they violently detonated and shattered the spire of the orbital, fire and atmosphere exploded into space as a bloom of death ruptured into the void halfway towards the moons surface.

"ALL FIGHTERS BREAK, BLAST YOUR WAY DOWN" Lord Warhead screamed down the TEAMCOMM channel as half the remaining fighters broke outwards from the tower and sped outwards and then down in expanding, jinked formations - engines burning at maximum capacity as they endeavored to avoid more of the Cavorite emplacement guns from the planets surface.

Lord Shadowscythe jammed the controls in panic as another fighter launched missiles at the battered remains of the elevator platforms, as the few remaining platforms burst into flames and tumbled downwards through the shaken remains of the spire, followed by the other half of Samurai flight as they shot down through the elevator.

Seconds later and the remaining Cavorite emplacements burst into live as beams of orange half-life lanced through space, another two Samurai fighters passed through the combined beams as the remaining fighters corkscrewed their pathways through the firepower of the Britannian defenses - their death screams never heard as the fighters atomised into clouds and exploded into violence and blue fire.

"All units, make your own way to target objective and make them suffer on the way down" Lord Warheads voice stated one last time as the fighters cut a path down to the moons surface.

Carnage ripped through the upper atmosphere as the Scythian and Immortal pilotted Samurai fighters raced down through and around the slowly descending spire that used to be the Orbital Elevator - each craft leaving smeared blue/orange flames in their wake as they pushed thier fighters beyond terminal velocity in order to escape the phased-orange beams of the Cavorite emplacements below them.

Lord Shadowscythe winced as the tower was collapsing around him, his own fighter just before ahead of the group as it raced down the tower as the crystaline central support shattered into glass segments each hundreds of meters long, twisting and bending the steel and titanium structures built around them in unholy directions as the tower could no longer support its immense weight, millions of tonnes of metal where about to come crashing down to the ground, burning their way through the atmosphere as they went.

Far above them the fightercraft's rear camera caught sight of the Tiara station, shattering into pieces acvross its mid section as the orbital elevator that used to support its gratuitous mass droppped away in massive chunks, the stations on each side of the linking walkways and catwalks activated thier bulkheads and emergency blockades as the station started to tear itself apart under the stress of gee forces, the no longer supported wieght of the station started to tear itself sideways, ripping through solid metals and tearing through power conduits and cables - shredding through whatever happened to be in the way, be it flesh, bone or otherwise.

A massive gout of flame ignites the skies far above and behind Lord Shadowscythe and a momentary second sun burst into magnificent life, whatever power generators and other systems used to support the mid section of the station gave their last breath of life and ended - a supermassive blast of energy and fire consumed what remained of the mid station as it finally tore itself away from the rest of the Tiara, leaving a bloody scar of dust, metal and glass to eviscerate through the now split Tiara station as the destruction carried through the rest of the stations.

Lord Shadowscythe focused once more as another lance of phased-orange light ignitied the path ahead - the Orbital guns still firing on the Orbital elevator as the structure ahead atomised into a cloud of dust - the fighters behind him jinked and turned to evade the path of the deadly beam as the HUD display flashed with warning lights and arror displays.

Speed was of the essence as the fighters sped past the beam before it completed its cleaving strike - seperating the already shattering tower in two, the previous section of tower already far above and behind them as the HUD displays flashed with warning markers as the end of the tower was rapidly approaching.

A magnification window appeared before his eyes as hidden low range lasers built into the combat harness and motion control systems followed his field of vision, magnifying the image of a dozen Britannian super-heavy tanks preparing at the bottom of the elevator shaft - each tank was a massive "Land Train" built of solid metal slabs and armour, covered in guns and plastered in the Britannian blues of their ground forces.

"All units, Britannian Super-heavies at the bottom of the shaft, targets are marked - tieing into TEAMCOMM now - open fire" Lord Shadowscythe relayed as a few short button presses and eye motions later marked the tanks for destruction. Second later more "fire and forget" Anti-matter missiles shot from the added missile racks of the fighters within the orbital structure and far ahead of the team - speeding faster and faster ahead and then finally making their fateful meeting with the tanks below.

Britannian troops had been making their move since the first alarms where raised - the garrison within had been using their Land-Train super heavy tanks as glorified trailer-dollies to move the masses of materials to and from the orbital elevators, today they had finally been used for their original purpose as the meager PDF forces prepared what was supposed to be a fire-corridor up into the collapsing tower.

Their folly had not been thought through by the unit commander, and at the last moment he cursed his own stupidity as more missiles than he could count came flying down the shaft, their final destination being the ground upon which he stood - before the pain of death could even register in his mind, his body had been utterly destroyed - not even atomic dust remained as man and tank alike dissapeared into blue/white flames as the entire platform burned away in the fires of a Matter/Antimatter annihalation - the floors, cielings and support towers of the entire room blasted away in less than a nanosecond.

The weight of what was left of the Orbital Elevator then took its place - no longer connected to the anchor structures deep below the elevator nexus - or even the rest of the room, gavity took its effect and what remained of the bottom of the massive ring of titanium and glass slammed downwards into the crater of the room, shattering everything that remained within before the core of the crystaline central tower followed immediatly afterwards, stabbing deep into the remains like a knife and exploded into a massive cloud of meter long shrapnel death.

A moment later more missiles exploded around the edges of the cieling, launched from the fighters racing past outside - another gout of blue/white fire and the collision of metals, glass and rock paused for a moment, cutting of the veins of support beams the entire structure was seperated and cauterised before the collision could complete its course - and the entire tower started to fall further sideways than down, Lord Shadowscythe and his fighter group hit the bottom of the shaft and changed into bipedal mode within seconds, weapons at the ready as they then burst in every direction from the shattered room and down the various sub-corridors and underground tunnels of the base before then being joined by the fighters outside - following their counterparts by transforming into bipedal mode and arming their weapons in mecha form before then following through the underground base in wolfpacks three fighters apiece.

As the Samurai fighters launched deeper into the base, explosions rocketted through the underground tunnels and caverns as a lone Britannian soldier - through luck or misfortune managed to survive the apocalyptic entry of the Scythian fighters with her embedded helmet camera intact.

Battle wounded and bruised, smothered in dust and debris - she coughed up wretches of blood and viscera as she crawled from the wreckage and ran before any more of the demonic Scythian fighters could claim her like they had just claimed the lives of her fallen compatriots.

Fire and chaos where king and queen of the cramped and twisting world that was the underground tunnels and corridors of the Britannian base and mines.

The fighters where now slowed from their previous bullet speeds to using frog jumps of speed - passing each other in turn as they reached another T-section or turning that marked the myriad of pathways between forges and refineries. Lord Shadowscythe turned another corner, the Samurai fighter with its Laser Gatling cannon and secondary Laser armed and hunting for targets as another three Samurai sped down the corridor ahead of him, levitating through the use of the jet engines now within the blocky humanoid fighters feet, Lord Shadowscythe jammed his pilot controls to join them and the fighter lifted clumsily off the ground before shooting down the shaft behind them, throwing mine-carts and hover-dollies away in the backlash of super-heated air from the fighters jetstream.

"All units, resistance is now minimal - no sign of either Cavorite or generators within eastern section, keep hunting" A reliably Scythian accent spoke in Lord Shadowscythe's earpiece as the fighters passed another cross section and descended to a lower level, the grays of concrete and metal changing for a more rocky hue of deep tan and older looking, partially rusted looking metal support beams.

The fighter at the lead of the group stopped for a moment and set down on the ground, weapons raised and wary - the fist containing the fighters missile compliment raised in a faux-"Halt" motion.

The fellow fighters moved in around the first as Lord Shadowscythe covered the rear of the formation as static washed over his HUD before stabilizing again.

The voice of the pilot behind him was Immortal, no mistaking the lower tones of the Terrorkahn pilots voice "Localized EM bursts, no associated radiation, no obvious source - not weapons fire but it is interfering with secondary systems. Advise caution."

"Move ahead on foot" Lord Shadowscythe ordered as the squad of four moved ahead down the shaft which then turned into a 30 degree downward incline, with another elevator platform at the bottom, loaded with container crates.

"We cannot get a reading this close, magnify on those boxes at the bottom of the shaft" He spoke aloud as the team of four focused.

"Box markings register . . . refined Cavorite - Military grade. That's our target, flagging it up on TEAMCOMM Hud displays now" The Immortal pilot spoke aloud as the team began a hasty descent down the shaft, almost skiing down the slope of the elevator with their rifles pointed down into the distance before them.

20 seconds passed as the Samurai fighters landed onto the platform with all the elegance of a flying brick, surrounding them where almost a hundred man-sized container boxes - all re-enforced and marked with hazard and warning labels to imply Military grade Cavorite - Lord Shadowscythe extended his fighter controls and the lower half of the Missile bearing arm split into a pair of crude manipulator claws.

Picking up a box and squeezing with some effort, his actions where rewarded with twisting metal and a ripping crunch as the re-enforced container gave away and a flow of fist sized red spheres rained from the box - Cavorite in its refined form was the closest thing to a mathematically perfect spheroid in the universe - the deep red coloration was the materials cross-insertion pattern from its native universe into our own mirroring the red-shift from the beginnings of time itself being reflected across time and space into the material that should not exist within it. As time and space continued the globules would eventually turn from red to a deep brown and eventually break and then become brittle as the universe succumbed to its eventual heat-death, in trillions of trillions of years time these globes would eventually shatter and whatever managed to worm its way into our reality, from a few mere atoms to the massive hoarde the Britannians where weaponising - would return to their native home, perhaps even taking some of our universe with it.

Staring at the globes he somehow felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, as if he was not only looking into something that should not be, but a bizarre infinity - looking into a black abyss that never ended, he suddenly felt immeasurably cold and empty - devoid of hope, or joy, or any other feeling.

Something was staring back at him - it could see him, see through him - his heart and mind suddenly filled with a terrified apathy, the terror was all, the terror was nothing.

His lips moved, he wanted to vocalize a scream but he couldn't - his body stopped, refusing to move any further as he felt his vision cone and shift as the entire world suddenly smacked sideways.

Another Samurai fighter had just backhanded his own with its goddamn missile fist, sending Lord Shadowscythe flying backwards and down onto the elevator wall.

"SNAP THE HELL OUT OF IT!" Lord Warhead yelled over the TEAMCOMM as Lord Shadowscythe suddenly realized he was no longer alone, the entire fighter group had eventually joined his squad of four - low murmured voices both Scythian and Immortal alike passing instructions and orders as the fighters loaded up two boxes of the Cavorite apiece and moved back towards the shaft.

"There is a reason why we need this stuff, and only this stuff can do the job - the less you know, the more pieces of your mind you can keep hold of" Lord Warhead spoke blankly "We have three times what we need, now we need to target the generators to the Cavorite emplacement guns, blow them the fuck up and get back to your ship"

Lord Shadowscythe took a sharp breath and his fighter to its feet, and then returning to hovering above the ground - Lord Warhead rose up the elevator first, carrying his own supply of Cavorite with him, Lord Shadowscythe paused for a moment and looked over and above the Cavorite supplies on the platform before him and into the vast, black cavern from which it was being mined - it seemed neverending, it swallowed all light and sound - and it was obvious the platform itself rested far below where it was currently stopped.

Part of his mind wanted to see, wanted to know why he felt his stomach lurch at the thought of what rested below - but his rational mind fought through and overcame the temptation.

If the Immortals where helping the Britannians mine and refine this stuff, it was something that needed to end - he armed every single Antimatter missile he had remaining and set them to autofire/proximity mode and launched them into the darkness in every direction before he then jolted the Samurai's engines into action.

Far behind him he saw the afterimage of a blue/white explosion in the distance, followed by the characteristic boom of the missiles blast. He never knew what he had destroyed in that distance below, but somehow a part of his soul felt more akin with the world.

"Kato, give us a sitrep on the outside - ASAP" Lord Shadowswcythe spoke aloud into the TEAMCOMM relay system as his Samurai fighter trailed behind the rest of the group, each fighter hopping in the same four-strong fireteams down the intertwined corridors and boom-ways of the Britannian construction lines and walkways.

"Unab - stablish direct sig - own distu - annian fighters laun - ollapsing" Was all that made it through the blasts of static as the fighters made their way through the extended tunnels, avoiding the same pathways through which they had made their entry in order to target and destroy the C.G.E power systems somewhere between their current positions and the weapons far above their heads.

"Anyone else - nal disruption?" Another voice cut through the static washing through the bandwidth as the fighter formations came to a gradual halt.

"Short range comms only" Lord Warhead spoke aloud over his own fighters radio system "Something is tearing through the upper bands of the TEAMCOMM, piggyback messages across teams if you need a signal to Stormsword One"

"Any idea what it causing it?" Another Immortal Pilot asked.

"Someone probably couldn't resist temptation" Lord Warhead replied, Lord Shadowscythe assumed automatically that was a barb at him - but pushed it out of his mind with the other insults and insinuations Lord Warhead had made so far. Yet again the bastard knew exactly what was going on and simply didn't let him in on the joke.

Eventually he would have to make him pay for that, along with the other tricks Lord Warhead had left out - and then the lives he had doubtless taken after that.

The team began moving far slower through the entwined underground tunnels, no signs of life other than the Scythian assault teams criss-crossing their way through the tunnels, the facility rocked occasionally from a distant explosion - as the Tiara far above continued to tear itself apart.

"ALL UN - KNOWN CONTA - AAG DEAT - BREAK BREAK BREA - " Kato's voice screamed over a half-opened TEAMCOMM channel as every fighter stopped suddenly, each member of Samurai flight only receiving half of the intended message as the distant explosions where suddenly replaced with the sound of a low-based thrumbing in the walls of the complex, followed by the unmistakable sound of weapons fire.

Cavorite weapons fire.

"All units stop - converge on myself and Lord Warhead and piece together that message" Lord Shadowscythe barked down the TEAMCOMM channel as he waited for a torturous 30 seconds as portion by portion Samurai flight moved in on their position.

Moments later the short range TEAMCOMM system, unfettered by the static overwashing every long range channel combined through the fighters HUD systems and pieced together the message.

The message that sent chills down the spines of every pilot there, Lord Shadowscythe felt the familiar feeling of falling down a rabit hole return in full swing and even Lord Warhead stopped for a moment.

"ALL UNITS"

"UNKNOWN CONTACT HAS JUMPED IN SYSTEM"

"IDENTIFYING CONTACT"

"SHRAAG DEATHSPHERE DETECTED!"

"ALL UNITS IMMEDITATE RETREAT. BREAK BREAK BREAK"

Katos voice then stopped completely, static washed through the TEAMCOMM channel and the link to Stormsword One was registered as being utterly destroyed as the Cavorite emplacements far above continued their relentless firing patterns the distant sounds of explosions could only mean one thing.

The Tiara far above was no longer being torn apart by its own inertia, it was being torn apart from the inside out by Meson bolt rounds targeting and shredding every living thing in sight as railgun rounds fired at hypervelocities through open hyperspace/FTL rifts and inside the poor souls above, turning them into bloody sacks of meat from the inside out. Power cores ruptured and exploded and systems went offline one by one.

Lord Shadowscythe felt the edges of an all-encompassing fear edge around his mind, which he fought back with an attempt at determination and purpose.

Which was when the only clear communications channel in the solar system opened up, on every channel and wavelength.

The voice boomed through the cockpit speakers of every fighter, each systems speakers attempting to dim the voice that climbed higher and higher in intensity - raw, uncontrolled hate bleeding through the edges of synthetic systems and hardware buffers.

"I HAVE COME TO CLEANSE THIS GARDEN. IF YOU DO NOT REVEAL YOURSELF - THEN THE VASSAL WILL BE SENT TO RETRIEVE YOU. PERSONALLY"

-----

High in orbit the deathsphere continued its barrage - the endless fire of Meson guns tore through the stations above the pitiful fleshling moon - but it stayed at range until it could efficiently blind their range and then move in for the kill against the planetoids Cavorite based weaponry - weaponry that could not kill the Shraag but would damage the current vessel beyond the limits of its use.

Deep within the sphere - there was no bridge, no crew quarters, no real engine room - the entire space was endless tunnels and spaces, archways and corridors built in every direction all towards a single, central chamber.

The entire ship skittered, clattered and clicked - the noises of the mindless insectoid thralls - the first species to realize what the Shraag was when it forced its way between the dimensions, it seeped into their minds and turned them all to its cause - now they existed as nothing more than tools for the greater being to interact with the world, a trillion eyes, ears and fingers for it to possess and use for what little usefulness they displayed before it snuffed them out and replaced them with more capable beings.

The creature once known as Loveless stood in the centre of what would be considered the planets "bridge" as it watched through the thousands of eyes and sensors as its plans where coming to pass - far below every sensor it had at its disposal confirmed that another Immortal was on the planet below - its quarry, despite the fluctuations in its life-signs it would make another, worthy thrall to its mind.

It had hunted across many worlds for this - another "Immortal" to corrupt and infect to itself - another step in the path to becoming its true form once more.

The satisfaction was palpable, delicious even. But first - it needed to cleanse the garden.

Below them, Cavorite weapon emplacements fired their etheric beams in ever possible direction - the few Britannian crews that still manned them did everything in their power to hold the line and make the cost of their lives equal in the amount of blood they would spill before they died - heroes all to the rest of the Empire. Their families never seeing the fallen loved again.

Little below them, The Scythian invasion team. Already fleeing from their snatch and grab in every possible direction to find an escape - Stormsword One was lost, presumed destroyed, and with them the only hope of escape until they found another craft capable of escaping the system, FTL, hyperdrive, Warp, wormhole or otherwise - the vague plan was to find a civilian vessel of any type and jump it before the Shraag ripped every soul on the little world away from their bodies in bloody fire.

Lord Shadowscythe turned and jinked another corner as the rest of the Samurai fighters moved around and between each other as they endeavored their escape.

Aboard the Deathsphere far above the creature that lurked and linked its way through the sacks of meat aboard started to focus its coalesced energies, struggling to link together the threads of the being that was far greater than itself, but was also itself - using the body it knew as "Loveless" as a node for the others around it, focused intently on the stations below, following the former lines of orbital elevators and down into the rock.

Then it concentrated, visualising tunnels and walkways - catacombs and storage systems.

Then bodies, burned, charred and cindered in the conflict between the other petty meats on this world where distorted. Somehow something on that world was blocking its greater abilities - its mind blurred and out of focus the deeper it went until its concentration broke and it was forced to start again closer to the surface.

It dug its mind into what would be described by others as "fingers" and clawed them harder and harder into the basis of its reality - a service corridor, low and wide and almost directly in the path of its prey.

Prefect.

Within moments reality rebelled as the creature forced its will, forming its way between the puny dimensions of this universe and bored a hole through what classed as the "space" between.

Black waves radiated from the vessel "Loveless" and its thralls, and then burst in a seeping mass of shadow - time froze for nanoseconds and bubbled into quantum foam states as the creature took a step forward.

Emerged.

Space and time reacted and dilated but the tunnel was complete - "Loveless" and thousands of the thralls stood forward into the tunnels, concrete grays and steel piping surrounded all, the smell of burnt flesh and conflict, the thickness of real, dirty air and the harshness of sulfur.

The lesser forms skuttled away, their lesser instincts kicking in as they strode walls, floors and ceilings. Chittering maws, jaws, eyes and claws, all covered in Armour plates inches thick and armed with handheld Meson cannons grafted into their very forms.

A memory flashed, too long ago to place where or when - but it was something old, something instinctive.

Millions of dead worlds. Trillions of corpses - a Garden almost free of taint. Glory and murder for all who dared to exist in its presence.

Still the great lessers resisted. The only ones who had managed to shield themselves when it had reached its full potential - it no longer needed its armies, as its mind expanded it turned all life, sentient, sapient or no - to dust - with the faintest of flickers of its power.

Yet they resisted.

So it found the insectoid ones, on the edge of sapience, the edge of sentience and forced its mind onto them, twisted its power into their evolution within two mere generations and poured the stolen technologies of its victims into them, half flesh, half machine and utterly mindless - now existing as nothing more than nodes for the greater beast.

It cloned and bred its beasts until they numbered in the millions and then poured them at its enemies, what they shielded themselves from psionically it destroyed physically until they created the great weapon that destroyed their species to send it back into its almost endless slumber.

And now, the weapon was again loose, but barely operational - and the fleshlings where split and fighting against each other, and some of them held the key to protecting itself against the weapon itself.

All that was left was to enjoy the wonders of its art, spreading death and unlife where it went, awakening the chunks of itself as it went until the first of the "Immortals" arrived, it would take him - it would twist him - it would inhabit and corrupt him and then it would control the key to true immortality, awaken its true self and present extinction to all others.

"Loveless" strode forward, every so often a still living flesh one would present itself - it took seconds to pierce their minds.

Britannians. War. Cavorite. Defend. Hope. Die. Scythians.

For the first time in an unending age it felt what it was like again to force its will on another being. A "female" "Britannian" "Engineer" she was wounded, but not dieing - armed with a "Pistol" she fired shot after shot at "Loveless" as it closed its pace - it felt no pain as the bullets evaporated before they even touched its true form. It lifted her by the neck from the wreckage that pinned her bloody form - it squealed in pain as it rose, held aloft by a single hand on the neck.

It looked at her, upon her and through her as she struggled to breath, struggled to curse, struggled to beg - it bored through her mind and soul before it felt satisfied with the few higher cognitive thoughts it could taste - it then exerted its power upon her.

She screamed in agony, writhing and noise as her skin and clothes atomized into dust, blood poured through its skin in uneven patches as it then evaporated before even touching the ground - it shook, it begged harder and then fell silent to the pain as it exerted more force, unbinding the atoms and burning them apart.

Moments later her body combusted, far too fast for the flames to catch - but the heat was enough to scar the flesh of the vessel. "Loveless" looked down to the dust that remained and then to the bloodied flesh of its palm, grinning as the corrupted cores stolen power healed the little wounds within moments of being inflicted.

Then its thralls found the first of its targets, the war machines made by those known as the "Scythians" energy beams and meson bolts crossed paths as Loveless strode with a purpose towards its mark.

"Sir! We have lost bulkheads 17 through to 37! Levels 1 through 9 are completely dark! Enemy forces on both sides are descending into the forges!"

Red lights flared and waned as the last alert klaxon heard by Britannian ears continued to wail its endless tone into the abyss.

The Weapons control center, a large dome like room that dropped into three levels was still crewed by the last of the Britannian forces of the Tiara defense network, tracking what few sensor grids they had left and opening fire with even fewer Cavorite defense guns from their hiding place little under a mile under the rocky surface of the little moon.

Britannian officers yelled orders as gunnery chiefs and ensigns took the slew of data they where being presented and turned it into cold hard retaliation - but their time was running out.

Outside the triple-hardened bunker doors the sound of gunfire and screaming could still be heard - the last steward defenders being felled by the ravaging hoards of monsters set loose by the Shraag.

And then, silence.

The last orders yelled across the dark and dusty room, dressed in sweat and fear - set the defense systems to automatic and let them prioritize targets.

Britannian soldiers of each rank and insignia then hid behind their desks and stations - arming their weapons for what should have been their valiant last stand.

A stand that never came.

Instead the unsuspecting waited, in fear and blood as the air in the room froze and grew cold - as if a wash of ice and static fell over the CIC. Slowly and surely each and every member of the group, be they hardened guards or lowly ensigns felt an aura of fear and hopelessness drop from the ceiling, an impossible emotional weight that removed any chance of salvation from the room.

Then, at their last moments a silence grew outwards from the door - the commander, a fat and fearful man realized they where never going to be invaded - they where being weighed up like meat for a butcher. His pistol dropped from his limp fingers to the ground as he felt the psionic presence of a thousand eyes pressing down on his soul.

Outside the door - the insectoid thralls of the Shraag raised their weapons - their Meson bolt canons lining up on their targets and opening the miniature FTL apertures that would guide the deadly railgun rounds inside their still living, still breathing targets, a moment late a single volley fired in unison.

Every single body bar one lone, solitary figure exploded outwards at the same time - fountains of blood and gore erupted from the boots of what used to be men and women, their bodies ruptured into bloody viscera and gore in a heartbeat as 47 Britannians where split across floors, desks, consoles, walls and ceiling.

The last light of a soul alive within the CIC opened his eyes - the world around him covered in flesh and blood spread across the room like the inside of some kind of demented abattoir, blood of his fellows dripping from his clothes, through his hear and onwards down off of his nose.

He looked down to his pudgy blood covered fingers and the pistol he had dropped to the floor as the triple-hardened blast doors simply ceased to exist and a being of dark light stood through into the room. The being known once as "Loveless" extended its psionic reach and simply started to pull the bases schematics, systems and passwords from the realm of the digital to the confines of its mind before it turned his attention to the last Britannian commander.

Within his mind? The last set of commands and controls not kept within digital systems - the fail-safes and protocols for the base defense systems and the self destruct for the dual-fusion generator deep beneath their feet.

The fat sack of a man quivered out of pure, primal fear - every single monster under the bed had walked up to the surface of reality and formed itself into this not-human man.

A drip of blood mixed with sweat. A single tear fought its way through the restraints of emotional conditioning. The scent of fresh urine filled the room.

" - we don't have much time left, this window is closing. The past and the future have already converged - "

The Shadowscythe's head pounded - his pulse thundered inside his head as his HUD indicated another target to be fired upon, the base had rapidly begun to fill with Shraag thralls, the sound of electronic lock and fire tones disappeared underneath the roaring thunder of laser and missile fire, another target was ripped into bloody chunks as the non-sentient AI locked another target and fired automatically as he flipped through target selection systems.

Through the thundering inside his head he could hear voices, far and distant - almost beyond the very realms of his hearing, as if a room full of people where deciding his fate from a place beyond his mind could even reach.

" - Do any of them know?"

"No. The nature of the multiverse is like a book flipped open at every page at the same time - even what you could hear then was beyond context - "

Far above, the empty command center buzzed with activity as the creature known as "Loveless" dropped the empty vessel that was the base commander to the floor - nothing more than atomised blood and dust remained, with the command codes within his mind he extended his psionic reach back into the realm of the machine - the Cavorite defence system guns switched targets and began charging.

On a distant monitor - smothered in blood and gore, a Scythian Veritech fighter was targeted and the weapon far above the surface turned and aimed - aiming almost directly at the ground itself as the weapon began its final charging process.

" - you can feel it, can't you? The walls of fate are falling down."

"Stop being so fucking cryptic god damn you! Enough riddles! too many have died for this!"

"You, the bloodied warrior, or him - the raging mind. The other that has given all and the maiden from the beginning. You have all had your paths changed by something beyond your compreh-"

Another explosion - another Veritech ripped to shreds by combined Meson bolt fire - Shadowscythe turned on his boost systems and evaded another infernous volley as Lord Warheads IFF transponder appeared on his hud display. Another gout of laser and missile fire ripped through the underground tunnel as the two veritechs combined their fire - Lord Shadowscythe could feel the anger and hatred building in his mind, in his heart - everything had gone to hell in a fucking handbasket. A mission he hated after a path of betrayal had him back to back with a man he wanted to grind so far beyond dead that not even the writers of history would know who he was. Surrounded by eldritch beasts and obscene creatures lead by a nascent mind of an ancient evil.

He let out a bloody, primal roar of anger as even more laser bolts and beams flew through the air. Blood, heat and fire." - well if you are going to be nothing but impertinent then here is the ultimatum. This is the last stop between worlds. None of them can stop what has happened - but some can stop the end of all thi-"

The Cavorite emplacement far above finalised its power systems - locked and loaded its safety interlinks and then released as terrajoules of power built up from geothermal and fusion generators far beneath vomited forth power to the weapons capacitor systems, which then fed the raw power into a beam emitted - directly into a chunk of Cavorite the size of a small house. Within less than a nanosecond the Cavorite beam formed and fired its beam down onto the Scythian fighter beneath - turning kilometers of barren rock into atomised nothingness as it then vaporised concrete and metal until it finally connected with the fighter within.

Lord Shadowscythe halted in fear for a moment as he recognized the orange hue of the Cavorite beam around him, he was ground zero to his own doom - his atoms would be ripped apart, and his only hope would be in not being able to feel the pain of his own death.

Except he didn't.

Within the boxes latched to the fighters hull - Carefully refined globes of Cavorite reacted - a beam shunted through another reality grinding relentlessly against the very skin of the Cavorite within - a defense mechanism to protect the eeping molecules of another reality against our own fought for dominance in a universe where neither should be.

An unrelenting force up against an immovable object.

The skin of the universe - trying to defend against a pair of fractures that should never have been forced up against each other, did the only thing it could.

It cracked.

One nanosecond, two veritechs where alone in amongst a horde of alien terrors fighting against the end.

The next nanosecond - nothing.

An explosion that had not been seen since the birth of the primal moon erupted from the skin of reality - expanding ever outwards until it violated kilometers of rock and metal - finally lurching out of the moons surface as a pillar of blinding not-light, ripping through everything in its path - an explosion 5 kilometers around and almost half the moons width cut through stellar gases and atoms until it blinked away.

The rest of the base vented its oxygen out from the newest fissure in its vast and broken skin, dragging Shraag Thralls out into space before what little gravity remained could hold them down, but the two veritech fighters where nowhere to be seen.

A ripple in time and space echoed off itself for a moment - forcing the last of the reaction into the only place it could heal.

He blinked against the wind hard pressed against his face, a moment of confusion and bewilderment gave way to a sudden realization.

He was quite simply, not where he should be.

White light and cloud filled his vision, the sky that was dotted through them was marked by a gray murk that stretched over an equally gray horizon. The sky was dull and mind fumblingly vast - potted with distant black explosions of smoke and fire. The clouds obscured most of the ground below, what little he could see was a patchwork of cement gray, glittering silver and white steel and distant orange fire.

A voice warked in his ear, the harsh tones of a radio channel but his mind missed the words as he looked down to his hands. Scythian combat Armour, more form fitting than what he was used to - and well worn in through the rigors of combat, some kind of mobile holographic console built into the wrist guards projected a keyboard and map display at him instinctively as he looked towards them, and then he looked down further again. The weapon in his hands was a model he didn't recognize, a multi barreled laser weapon, larger than the laser carbines he was used to but smaller than a heavy weapon - it was rugged and heavy, and utterly unknown to him.

The words "Assault Laser Rifle" filled his mind, he didn't know how he knew this, but he somehow accepted the fact that this was his weapon.

He looked left and then right, he was surrounded by fellow Scythian troopers on each side, in equally heavy Armour and carrying the same weaponry - somewhere between the marines he knew and SIBAS suits, integrated power supplies, shoulder based aiming systems and various other combat items built into form fitting holsters and mag grips on the legs and hips.

He was on a dropship of some kind, slower and more heavily armed than a carnivore class dropship - it had no less than three underslung weapon emplacements firing full blast from the underside of the craft, he had no doubt the other three where also firing at full blast from the other.

Another fact he should not have known, but he somehow accepted without question - as if he had somehow always known this fact.

The clouds beneath started to clear as he saw the vast city beneath. Shells of steel and concrete stretched in every direction in vast grid patterns, equally spaced to fill every space at every level - roads and platforms interlinked at every direction, a vast complex that continued onwards and beyond the horizon, a city not built by a human intelligence.

Another fact his mind somehow picked from somewhere and then accepted without question.

Fire from the ground increased in its intensity - in the distant skies a wing of Pirana class assault ships began a strafing run on the advancing Scythian positions, between him and them? An Immortal carrier parked on the ground, crashed from the battle in orbit - the Immortals had dug in and had been strafing both sides with hit and run assaults, preventing either side from achieving victory, beyond those - the target - an enormous fusion generator compound that was generating power for the shield generators high above, the latch and key for the entire battle.

A voice twinged in his ear, something about "Preparing to activate grav packs" followed by the rallying cry of the men around him as his feet acted without his volition and he jumped into the sky - arms stretched around him into the blustering winds of the horizon.

The cold of the harsh wind ripped against his face as the ground raced every closer towards him, cries in his earpiece shouted something about watching for "fire corridors" and "AA fire" but he ignored them, his brain placed his mind and soul halfway between here and somewhere else, as if he was not the only one inside his head for this - he was not alone, he had . . . someone else within him, and all the time they where fighting together, he could not be harmed.

Pre-cognitive narrative? The words jumbled through his head, they didn't make sense, but he knew that somehow he could not, he would not die here in this place. Not today anyway.

Gravity raced, pressing time towards his union with the ground below - his hand reached into his chest and with a brief tap he was suddenly enveloped in a bubble of air that surrounded him, he felt weightless and disconnected from physics as the bubble of gravity surrounded him, easing his gradual fall to the ground as he passed down between concrete hulks of the buildings around him.

Homes, schools, offices, hospitals - the long gone history of the lives that used to fill this place - a union of man and machine that covered a world and held up an empire. Held up an ally.

An ally that he now had to kill.

As his decent met with the floor begun, his feet touched the asphalt beneath and he began a short trot to the nearest cover, grateful that the civilian populace had been evacuated as the first Scythian shot was fired - he moved between burnt out buildings as the rest of his team appeared as green diagonal shapes and distance markers on the HUD display of his Armour - the group moving with silent precision between the former dead mans land of the inner cityscape towards the looming Fusion generator complex in the distance.

The Fusion Generator was the largest, and last of the facilities still operational on the planet, built like an old fashioned nuclear generator - a huge cooling tower that was tri-sected into three sections, its overwhelmingly huge cooling systems built into dual helix arrays, spinning endlessly within the structure to vent excess heat as harmlessly into the atmosphere as possible - it was transmitting endless wireless power to its own shield generators and those far above, keeping the entire planet off limits from the titanic forces above it - the teams goal was simple.

Drop within an acceptable distance of the facility. Check

Move towards the facility. Terminate any hostile elements.

His mind tagged for a moment on the wording of the order, a part of him questioned "terminate" rather than the usual "neutralize". The phrasing was off, the lexicon somehow wrong. At least Neutralize gave the option of a non-lethal means to remove a threat. Terminate . . . his brain hooked into this for just a moment but then somehow slid away from it - the questions within his mind clouded behind a fog.

Infiltrate and destroy the facility at any cost.

Exfiltrate the planet if possible. If not - disrupt and destroy as many hostile targets as possible.

He moved, low and fast through the burnt out remnants of a former highway system - hover vehicles of varying types that had used a method of refined monopole magnets to repulse against water streams within the roads themselves, taken and refined from the Genoans before they died out. Before everything turned.

His mind scratched at that detail - something was wrong here, wrong behind imagining - he ducked behind the rear of a cargo hauler as he watched a missile lazily career its path through enemy AA fire and collided with an office block in the foreground ahead of him, plumes of raw anti-matter erupted from the fire of the blast and melted the entire structure exploded outwards like an oversized firecracker - according to his HUD display, a dozen or so Buzzard class mecha units winked out in a moment, devoured by blue/white fire.

The flak fire above intensified in its patterns and arcs as more missiles fell to the ground, starting as dead weights in the sky until they fell beneath a certain height and then their rocket engines ignited and they ploughed into their intended targets with an unknowable ferocity.

For a moment the AA fire paused as a flight of unknown mecha units took to the skies, definable AN targets, but of a type he had not seen before, multi-armed winged beasts with jumpjets at all angles - they took to the skies as angels of fury, unleashing fire in all directions. He ducked for a moment and ran around to the corner to hide from the fire that came his way - red and green laser blasts peppering the ground where he had once been as they passed towards the Scythian lines.

One of the dropships he had recently been a passenger of opened fire with its six underbelly guns, shredding one of the targets before the rest combined their fire and decimated the offending craft - he watched as P.A.V.L fire burst from the buildings beneath - lances of blue fire reached up towards the mecha, taking out some of their number before their wielders moved onto another point to fire from.

Which as when he noticed a glowing red fireball falling from the sky, a Scythian Regent class frigate had strayed too close to the planetary shields and what remained of the Orbital defense grid, and had taken a mid-section hit - essentially bisecting the offending frigate that then fell to the only place gravity could take it, down to the planet beneath. He watched dumbfounded as the remnants of the ship fell through the fire and the flames of the battle in the air and collided with a skyscraper on its way down, leveling the oval shaped building and the blocks beneath before finally making its fateful meeting with the ground beneath and exploding into a humongous fireball that leveled well over a city block. Somehow with this bullet point to understate the conflict the fighting in the streets became more intense, more laser fire heard in the distance, more AA fire penetrated the skies above and the Immortals could be heard in the distance, the near-characteristic sounds of flachette guns pierced the din of the conflict abound, so he did the only thing he could have done in the face of everything else. He moved onwards.

Smoke and dirt filled the air as he moved ever forward, down tightly packed alleyways and vistas of open steel and concrete - bleached white by design but turned varying shades of black, brown, gray and red - the corpses of the dead filled the streets as he passed them, civilians and military alike - inter-spaced with drones and automa of every design available, worker drones alongside Havok and Tornado class mechanised combat drones - the streets and buildings long since turned into murderholes and trenches at every storey. The cities had long since fallen, been taken and then assaulted in turn - each side claiming temporary dominance in a never ending turn of war and bloodshed that had claimed this world time and time again since the Immortals had invaded.

He turned another corner, another empty street filled with the dead - the neverending silence of the air was punctuated by the distant cries of empty gunfire, the sound of a once living body screaming its last bloody breath before falling to the floor with a damp emptying of blood and gore.

In the sky above another craft cut a curdling screech across the sky - an Immortal fighter that had somehow managed to launch from the fallen carrier in the distance beyond had taken a hit of AA fire, a loose blast of distant railgun fire had hit the vagrant craft in its midsection, separating the power supply from the generator and the engine systems and the black slab of metal and plas-glass was falling to the sky with an ear splitting cry of its terminal dive before it collided with a distant skyscraper. The structure of white steel and gray concrete buckled and split across its midsection as it slowly became two halves of a building, the lower half buckling under the stress of its support beams being shattered into shards of indeterminate metal and the top half folding over itself to begin its meeting with gravity, falling in slow motion until it eventually became one with a highway overpass a short distance below, splitting the roadway in two and continuing onward to the ground below. Gravity and concrete made their terminal meeting far beneath his feet and a gout of fire erupted from a power mains below the ground, plasma and gas igniting in the air and spraying more dust and fire into the air.

His fingers grasped harder still against the Laser Assault Rifle in his hands, the titanium grip warming from the sweat in his palms - the weight of the weapon reassured him for just a moment, but he knew the entire concept was folly - death could come for him on wings swifter than a Scythian maiden at any point, an old battlefield legend said you would never hear the shot that would kill you.

A thought swept up to fight it for a moment, the other in his mind spoke without words - a knowledge he never seemed to have before seemed to remind him that he would not die here, not now anyway - not until his task was complete. An empty reassurance filled his mind as he moved past an empty vehicle, a ground car that had been used as an emergency services police cruiser. The ill fated vehicle had been part of the civilian evacuations - it had been burned out from the inside by an Immortal HIVE shell that had been fired from above - a strafing run - his mind assumed, the round had exploded without breaching the outside of the craft - it had burnt the occupants to cinders while leaving the hull intact, a crude mockery to those who even attempted to resist the Immortals expansionist genocide.

A split second later he was forced to push these thoughts from his mind, he ducked suddenly. Combat influences and a lifetime of training kicked in. He ducked down and around, behind the front of the vehicle as a green lance of light, Ionised plasma fire; filled the space where his body was about to be.

The assault rifle already armed and ready to fire, he lifted his arm around - hastily firing the rifle around his arm, using one empty hand to hold the weight of the firing arm as he fired blind down the highway section before him, filling the air with blue lances of laser fire - each barrel spinning in quick succession to bring death to his foes.

He fired long enough to realize the enemy had not returned fire, but he knew not to stick his head out and check. Instead he moved across to the other side of the vehicle and then around the corner, attempting to approach his enemy from the flank, a 45 degree firing angle from his last guess, he kept his head low and his breath slow and steady as he moved. A moment later he reached his firing angle as he lent his weight into the shell of the vehicle beside him and aimed his rifle around the corner to see his foe.

The machine was low, squat - a white metal brushed micro-mecha on a four legged based with a jutted angular torso and small camera-like headpiece linked into the laser rifle in the machines gunsteel fingers.

The aged TSOC machine moved in slow and clunky patterns - it had been assembled from the bits and pieces of older versions of itself - a burn pattern on one armour plate did not match with the rest, gunfire dents and plasma scorches that made a mish-mashed pattern of faux-urban camouflage across the machines metal skin - it launched another volley at the space around the corner he occupied not a moment ago. Another pattern of green lances filled the air - laser fire tore through the vehicles hull and eradicated the space where he had once been before the machine then moved up - placing him in the ideal position for an ambush strike.

He hoisted the Assault laser in his hands and shifted around the corner - the rear of the machine now facing him as he lurched around the final corner and levelled the weapon, the micro-barrels started to revolve as he pulled the trigger, filling the air between him and his target with a flurry of blue-white light that shredded the rear armour of the walking machine. The fury of laser blasts with the heat of a small sun ripped through combat plating and wiring as the machine turned on its hip axis, legs facing forward as the torso faced towards him and opened fire. He bolted behind his cover again as green splashes of after-light filled his vision, but he was already on the move.

A micro missile flew from the machine as it plodded its way back towards him and around the corner - as he ducked behind a nearby clump of conrete the 20 cm long missile collided with a building some distance before him and ripped away a support pillar of one corner of an office block, and the fire-gouted structure swayed, but against all odds - stayed upright.

He lifted the rifle above his head, and fired blind over the top of the cover he had taken, pulling his arm back down again to avoid the incoming laser fire as he then reached into his belt and pulled out of a pocket what looked like three metal cylinders connected to each other in a triangular formation.

His hud came flicked with a targeting reticule as he lifted his head for just a moment, long enough to target lock the incoming machine before ducking again - a quick flash of hud flashes and data windows and layout information flashed past his eyes until they where replaced with a small square that read "Target locked" inside it.

He then threw the three cylinders into the air together - activating their auto-detonation sequence, as they reached the apex of the throw, they exploded into a rain of directed miniature EMP blasts, light, sound and chaff particles - blinding the inbound machine as he took his chance to run for the office block ahead of him, green bolts of light splashed harmlessly around him as the blinded machine attempted to finish its programming and end his organic life - but found itself unable to resolve a hit as the weapon flew wild.

As he passed another corner, another concrete and steel pillar - EMP damping systems and backup program units kicked in and the four legged walker began making its move towards him, moving at a diagonal path towards him as he fired through holes and eddies in the wall - every so often a blue/white lance of light would connect with the machine, only for the machine to return fire with its own pulses of green heat and light, leaving scorch marks and irradiated concrete behind its target.

He ducked and weaved again as he moved behind another low-cut wall and made his way through the dirt and dust as his foe made its way further towards him, only for them both to be distracted by a low-flying screech as another Immortal Magog fighter tore across the sky above them both - dropping some unseen but not unheard ordinance on a nearby structure - causing the ground to shake and dust to fall from above.

It did however, give him the moment he needed as he lurched above the cover once more and levelled his Assault laser on the mechas head unit and opened fire, the first few shots bounced harmlessly off of the units armour - but the last few hit the camera unit directly and shattered the glass covering the camera unit as the blasts of light continued onwards and slagged the viewpiece mechanism and LED plates.

For a moment the machine wobbled on its feet, unable to continue its path as he moved from one length of cover to another - the rifle shouldered and firing full blast at the machine as it switched to RADAR and LIDAR based systems and the green bolts of light started flying at him again in full force.

As he stopped for a moment, he reached down to the armoured pocket on his leg and pulled out a stretched cylinder object with yellow and blue markings on one side - an Antimatter grenade and primed it for remote detonation, waiting for the right moment, seconds later the machine stopped firing and he threw himself around the corner, firing the assault laser with one hand and rolling the grenade with another.

Just as the machine drew its targeting system on him, he turned and ran - feeling hot, singed air behind him as the green bolts flew again. All he had to do was keep moving.

3.

2.

1.

The grenade, rolling along the concrete floor - had drawn to a close just close enough to the machines front legs to secure the killing blow as the atom supply of antimatter reacted in the vacuum chamber inside the grenade and let out a sudden explosion of blue light, taking the machines front legs and the concrete beneath it into obliteration in a nanosecond. With nothing to keep the machine upright - it fell foward on its face and through the new hole in the floor beneath it, smashing onto the floor on the level below and shattering what must have been several important systems. He had pulled himself upright and moved in to secure his kill. The machine, did not move - thoroughly deactivated he counted his blessings that it had only been a re-hashed model and not a production line machine, he holstered his assault laser to his chest again and took a moment to breath.

Not long to go now, a part of him thought - another strange thought that was not his own. He welcomed this one, it was right after all.